André Eve: The craftsman behind the rediscovery of old roses.
André Eve left us on the night of August 1, 2015, and we'll always remember a memory, an anecdote or a smile from this outstanding gardener, lover of old roses and creator of modern varieties who, throughout his life, with great generosity, loved to share his passion! Without a doubt, he must have joined the rose paradise.
Born on August 18, 1931 in the Paris region, André Eve arrived in Pithiviers in 1958, to take over the Robichon company, specialized in rose creation and also a landscape company. He was then able to give free rein to his passion for roses, and in particular for old varieties, which had fallen into oblivion to make way for the only modern varieties, with their often turbinated flowers, stiff stems and rarely fragrant flowers.
In 1968, he created his first variety, 'Sylvie Vartan'®, and this first attempt proved to be a masterstroke!
In 1978, he bought a house and began designing his garden, which he opened to friends. On trips to France and abroad, he collected dozens of varieties from collectors and rose gardens.
In 1983, an article in "Mon jardin, ma maison" (My garden, my home) sparked a craze for these old roses and their ambassador. Requests poured in, and André grafted his first old roses for shipment to his customers.
1985 saw the printing of the first André Eve Old Roses catalog: a simple list carefully describing 275 varieties, including 60 botanicals! Each year, the catalog is enriched and photos appear, and now comprises 100 pages and over 600 varieties.
To cope with this success, André moved in 1990 to Morailles, south of Pithiviers, and created a garden around the farm.
In 2000, he retired, but continued to offer his invaluable and friendly advice to his successors, who took up the torch in the same spirit as André. During his retirement, he designed the extension to the Morailles garden, travelled to plant festivals as a true ambassador for the house, and welcomed friends and visitors to his garden in Pithiviers. In his gardens, he has always combined roses with perennials, which he describes as his best companions, as well as clematis and irises, creating curving paths that make it impossible to see the whole garden at a glance, but compel the visitor to wander along this charmingly winding path. It was a model that was often copied by many visitors, and André was delighted that he was able to share his life's passions in this way!
Tribute to André Ève (by Ingrid Astier)
André Ève spent his life bent on beauty. He was a saintly man. But he was also a bon vivant, and I'm not surprised that he asked for champagne before leaving us. André loved life, and would never have wanted us to be sad, for he put sunshine in every thought. He left in the middle of summer, like a ripe fruit picked by heaven from its orchard.
I met him when I was writing Le Goût de la rose. He spoke of 'Sylvie Vartan' as one of his children, and was proud to be the father of a vaporous, nonchalant tribe in the rose gardens. I've never seen a garden as beautiful as his in Pithiviers. When he spoke of 'Suzette', 'Suzy' and 'Suzon', it was like something out of a fairy tale. No one knew better than him how to let vines run free. With him, they went wherever they wanted. And they returned the favor, cascading thousands of golden hearts every year.
The secret of his garden? Others would have prided themselves on mastering it all. André, on the other hand, would reply, amused: "Women! It was they who would have inspired the curves of Eden de Pithiviers... As if he'd cut out the grassy paths modelled on the hips of Mae West, an actress he wouldn't have shied away from...
André Ève was a wise man, too. For him, flowering meant "eleven months to dream about it, one month to enjoy it!" That was one of his gardening adages.
Heuchera, hostas, delphiniums, peonies... You knew how to marry them, André, as if your hand was hiding behind nature to fade into the background.
To you and Guy Delbard, I owe the pleasure of naming this delicate rose 'Jardin de Granville'. But I owe you so much more. I owe you the infinite poetry of old roses, which always makes me look back at these unruly beauties. Fontenelle, in his Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes, made roses speak. In the rustle of their sugared ball gowns, the roses murmured: "We've always seen the same gardener; in rose memory, we've only seen him. He certainly doesn't die like us; he just doesn't change
So, André, in the name of all your roses that contribute to the harmony of the world, I know that, like beauty, you are on the side of eternity.
Ingrid Astier, writer and godmother of the 'Jardin de Granville ®' rose